Paper On Heroes

Position Paper on Heroes
On September 11th 2001, New York City, Washington D.C., and Somerset County, Pennsylvania all came face to face with an unthinkable tragedy. When the emergency response teams were sent out to the sites, they had no idea what they were going to experience. They helped others to safety and then turned right back around to help someone else. These are America's real heroes. As The United States changes because of these tragic events, the focus of our heroes should be placed on everyday people and not sports and movie stars.
"A hero should be someone who unselfishly does something for someone else, regardless of danger." Marylyn Schwartz wrote this in the Houston Chronicle on Monday, October 8, 2001. Do sports
stars face much danger to make a touchdown, goal, homerun, etc.? Not really. They may face the danger of breaking bones or getting some pretty nasty bruises, but that's about it. All too often these are the people that children look to as a heroic figure. Little boys think Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, and Barry Bonds are some of the greatest people ever born. Granted that they all performed an amazing feat, but that makes them no more qualified to obtain the status of heroic. Little girls are looking to Britney Spears, Jennifer Lopez, and Christina Alguilera as role models and sources of encouragement. They should be looking at the women who put their life on the line as police officers and peacekeepers.

A local hero died early Saturday morning after he battled a six-alarm fire in the Galleria area of Houston, Texas. Fire Captain Jay Jahnke and his crew went up to the fifth floor of the burning to aid people in evacuating. Once the fire reached the floor they were on, he was overcome by smoke and trapped inside with only a limited amount of oxygen in his tank. A four-person rescue crew was able to get him out of the building, but later died at Memorial Hermann Hospital. Jahnke was a 20-year veteran of the Houston Fire Department.
It is doubtful that emergency workers head off to their job everyday hoping to become a hero.
Sometimes they are faced with situations in which they are thought of to be heroic. These people are the real life heroes that should be admired for their achievements and qualities. They are not in their line of work for the money or the fame, but because they sincerely enjoy helping others. Not every person who commits an act of selflessness in order to save a life will be remembered by name, but the people they saved also will not forget them.
I do realize that it is an individual's decision to choose who their heroes are. I'm not telling anyone that they should have the same heroes that I do, but instead they should look closer at their own personal heroes. Are people your heroes because they can act and are nice to look at or because they are true heroes that show leadership ability and take charge when they are needed to?
I also think that children should see more exposure to good people doing good things. This change would have to take place within the media. On the nightly news we see maybe one clip of someone doing a good thing for a community, person, or even an animal. We hear about 10 minutes worth of sports clips though. One reason for this could be that the people who helped someone didn't think twice about their act. It just came naturally and they don't see it as being heroic, but just simply nice. Nice is an understatement in most of the
cases. "We can be heroes, just for one day." These are the immortal words of songwriter and performer David Bowie. It takes special ability to capture the attention of millions of people at a time. Movie stars and sports stars have fine-tuned their ability to do so. It takes courage and bravery to act selfless in a time of danger. Emergency workers and police officers show this many times a day without thinking twice about the dangers. They are the true heroes that need to be recognized.